Our Rally story from Utah... a short crazy story from a couple of lucky riders

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Our Rally story from Utah... a short crazy story from a couple of lucky riders

Here’s a short story about some troubles that can come up at a rally… Ill keep it short.

A group of us, about 5 guys, went to the BMW rally in Southern Utah in Panguitch, UT. On Saturday, we went riding, and saw some awesome country side, the most beautiful was near Escalante, UT, in the Escalante Canyons area. As I was coming off the “hogback” I ran over a cattle guard. A few miles later, The TPMS (tire pressure management system) started flashing red and yellow, indicating a severe tire failure. Sure enough, I had one. So, I found me a place to pull off the road. The tire was REALLY severely damaged, and beyond repair. My friends pulled over, and we worked on it for a couple of hours, but we couldn’t get it to hold air. Also, there was no cell service.

So, my buddy Bob said, hop on the back of my GSA, and we can ride back to the campsite. Well, the campsite was about 140 miles away, but I didn’t want to walk back, so I hopped on… It was a fairly serious mountain road, but the scenery was gorgeous, so off we go, leaving my RT parked on the side of the road.

About 40 miles down the road, was a little town called Tropic. Pretty little UT town, clean, and pretty with one traffic signal. We were slowing down (you have to do that in those little Utah towns) and both Bob and I saw a guy on a Harley parked perpendicular to the roadway looking around. As we got closer, he looked our way, and both Bob and I made eye contact with this guy… We were probably going 20 to 25 miles an hour, and we saw him pull out a little, and he was looking our way. Bob slowed a little more, and moved to the inside lane as the guy came to a full stop. When we were about a car length away, he slipped the clutch, started to pull out, and T-boned us. He wasn’t going fast, but his front tire hit us right in the pannier, right behind my foot.. Probably about 2 or three inches behind it. His bike went down. When he hit us, the rear of Bob’s bike went up in the air probably about a foot, and somehow, Bob kept the bike upright and semi-controlled, as we were able to pull over to the curb. How he did that, I have no idea. AND, nobody had any injuries, which was amazing to me.

Our newly found Harley friend, was from Canada, and spoke no English, his female friend did speak some broken English, so Bob swapped insurance info with them. In about 30 minutes, the State Police pulled up, and Sgt Cox worked the collision. He was a great guy, and offered to haul me back to where out tents were in Panguitch. We had a great talk, and being in a patrol car brought back fond memories. Bob and my friends rode back to Panguitch.

After multiple trips back and forth from Loma to Panguitch a few times with my truck and trailer, my bike made it to Grand Junction BMW, where it was repaired with a new rear tire. Bob rode from Panguitch to Gunnison, with his jacked up pannier, and his tail light assembly and license plate bungied to his bike, along with all his camping stuff… He looked like the Beverly Hillbilly. We planning our next trip.

After the Canadian Harley rider hit Bob's bike, Bob swapped insurance info with him... Basically, his insurance was worthless! He had insurance, but it was for CANADA, not the US. SO, when Bob called his insurance company to file a claim, it was immediately denied. The Canadian insurance company said that only the insured (Canadian guy) can actually file a claim. So, now Bob files an uninsured motorist claim with his insurance company, has a $1000 deductible, and a crashed GSA. That's BS.